Armenian flags in the red, blue and orange flag of Armenia flew in the streets of Los Angeles yesterday, at a march commemorating the death of 1.5 million Armenians in what is considered the first genocide of the 20th century, the Associated Press reported, quoted by BTA.
Participants in the demonstration gathered in the "Little Armenia" neighborhood. in Los Angeles before heading down Hollywood Boulevard. Another march was planned, ending with a protest in front of the consulate of Turkey, the successor state of the Ottoman Empire, which led the mass deportations and massacres of Armenians at the time.
The large Armenian community in the Los Angeles area is marking Armenian Genocide Memorial Day long before Joe Biden in 2021 becomes the first US president to use the word "genocide" for a description of what happened, AP notes. Until then, the White House had avoided using the term for fear of alienating Turkey, a NATO ally that denies the genocide took place.
Biden repeated the term yesterday in a statement in which he described the "campaign of cruelty" on April 24, 1915, began with the arrest of Armenian intellectuals and public leaders.